South Florida Crime

MIAMI (CBSMiami/NSF) — A child neglect conviction was upheld for a man who was holding his 2-year old child while doing drug deals.

A state appeals court upheld the conviction Wednesday against James Thompson, the defendant in the Miami-Dade County case.

Thompson challenged his conviction on a charge of child neglect not causing great bodily harm.

The ruling by the 3rd District Court of Appeal said a detective in November 2011 saw Thompson involved in six hand-to-hand drug transactions while standing on a sidewalk with a child in his arms.

A jury found Thompson guilty of the child-neglect charge, and the appeals court upheld that decision.

“We find little difficulty in concluding that Thompson’s willful exposure of his two-year-old child to multiple drug transactions could reasonably be expected to result in serious physical injury or a substantial risk of death to the child,” wrote Judge Thomas Logue, joined by Chief Judge Frank Shepherd and Judge Linda Ann Wells. “As this court has already recognized, ‘drug rip-offs’ are ‘common place’ in our community ‘and usually involve violence with a firearm resulting in death or injury.’ ”
“The News Service of Florida contributed to this report.”